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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23924074">Stratocumulus</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kouen_chan/pseuds/Kouen_chan'>Kouen_chan</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Hypnosis Mic AUs [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Katekyou Hitman Reborn!, ヒプノシスマイク | Hypnosis Mic (Albums)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe, Dying Will Flames (Katekyou Hitman Reborn!), Gen, Introspection</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 21:09:03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,137</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23924074</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kouen_chan/pseuds/Kouen_chan</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Jinguji Jakurai is a cloud.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Amemura Ramuda &amp; Aohitsugi Samatoki &amp; Jinguji Jakurai &amp; Yamada Ichiro, Izanami Hifumi &amp; Jinguji Jakurai &amp; Kannonzaka Doppo</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Hypnosis Mic AUs [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1725181</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>49</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Stratocumulus</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>1.</strong>
</p><p>He is ten when it appears.</p><p>Everything blurs, bodies slumped against walls and floors, warm blood soaks through his clothes, but everything is <strong><em>coldcoldcoldcold.</em></strong> Running would mean leaving mother and father behind. Fighting would mean death. In the end, there is no choice, no action, just a gunshot.</p><p>Jinguji Jakurai was a quiet and meek child, yes, but in the end, he was also a stubborn one.</p><p>In one universe, the attacks never happened. He grows up and learns the hardships of life while holding steady to his morals.</p><p>In another universe, Jinguji Jakurai dies. He dies nameless and forgotten, another victim to the ever-growing crime in Tokyo.</p><p>In this one? He bursts into purple flames, wild and dangerous, and most importantly, <em>unstoppable</em>.</p><p>
  <strong>2.</strong>
</p><p>A yakuza group from Shinjuku finds him first and takes him in. They find him in midst of corpses and smoke, a hauntingly calm child in a hauntingly quiet scene. </p><p>They clean and feed him.</p><p>They force him into a life of crime.</p><p>They teach him and watch him grow.</p><p>They chain him down and label him a flight risk.</p><p>And Jinguji Jakurai <strike>loves</strike> hates them. </p><p>But they are <em><strong>pack</strong></em> and Shinjuku is his <em><strong>territory. </strong></em></p><p>
  <strike> <em> <strong>So God help those who dare to touch what's his.</strong> </em> </strike>
</p><p>
  <strong>3.</strong>
</p><p><em>"Inverted cloud,"</em> they call him.</p><p>He doesn't fully understand what that means, but he smiles and holds his temper as they hold him and prevent him from wandering. Mother hadn't liked his anger, so Jakurai would do his best to honor her.</p><p>It's like a cage.</p><p>Trauma doesn't heal easily, and so he clings to the past with a fervor.</p><p>He learns and learns and learns, absorbing knowledge like a sponge. He goes to school and listens. The library becomes <em>his</em> spot, and so no one dares to invade even as they keep careful watch over him.</p><p>Father would have loved it, a true scholar at heart.</p><p>As he grows and learns, a spark and fire burns inside, ever growing.</p><p>One day he will be unstoppable, free, and strong.</p><p>But today is not that day, not yet.</p><p>
  <strong>4.</strong>
</p><p>He is fifteen and his hands are stained red with the blood of his victims. </p><p>Assassination pays well, and Jakurai has never accepted failure.</p><p><strong>Ill-Doc</strong> becomes a household name in the underground, with 100% kill rate.</p><p>He hates it, but taking assassination jobs means he get to leave base, that he gets a measure of freedom. And Jakurai would do <em>anything</em> to be free.</p><p>This is how he meets Superbi Squalo.</p><p>
  <em> <strong>"VOOOOIIIIII!!!"</strong> </em>
</p><p>He gets to know the second-in-command of the Varia for a total of seven days. In Superbi, he sees a wildness that he could never hope to match and a loyalty that burns deep.</p><p>He doesn't understand why Superbi stuck around for so long, maybe it was an attempt to court him into the Varia, maybe Superbi was pitying him, but for Jakurai, it was the first time in a very long time that he felt true fondness.</p><p>When Superbi leaves, he leaves behind a ring and a box. He carries home to the Varia a debt, but Jakurai never sees him again and the debt is never claimed.</p><p>He wonders if this is admiration and if he happens to let his hair grow out, then no one ever mentions it.</p><p>
  <strong>5.</strong>
</p><p>
  <em>"The sole meaning of life is to serve humanity."</em>
</p><p>Jakurai had always admired the writing of Leo Tolstoy, but one quote in particular had always stuck with him. </p><p>What was humanity? Who and what exactly did humanity entail?</p><p>He didn't know and didn't care, but as he watches the doctors attempt to save yakuza and civilian lives alike, he thinks that maybe this is what Tolstoy means.</p><p>The ones who raised him are dead. He is free now, no one to hold him back and no one to chain him, so he disappears into the shadows, a wolf with a mane of purple flames by his side.</p><p>Several days later, Jinguji Jakurai resurfaces as a new student at Waseda University. It would have been safer if he'd left Tokyo, or even just Shinjuku, but Shinjuku was his <strong><em>territory</em></strong>, and he refuses to let go.</p><p>
  <em> <strike>Later, the news will talk about a mysterious and bloody massacre of the yakuza groups in Shinjuku, and Jakurai watches, bloodthirsty and gleeful.</strike> </em>
</p><p>
  <strong>6.</strong>
</p><p>He is 23 when he finally lays Ill-Doc to rest.</p><p>He is 23 and in medical school when he is finally able to put a name to a face, one that probably shouldn't have taken as long as it actually did, embarrassingly enough.</p><p>
  <em>"What the hell, Jinguji, we went to the <strong>same</strong> <strong>middle school and high school!"</strong></em>
</p><p>To be fair, he'd been more preoccupied with learning the ins and outs of assassination at the time, but he feels that he owes Amaguni Hitoya a very big apology.</p><p>Amaguni Hitoya, Jakurai learns, is strong in his beliefs, but carries an inferiority complex that may or may not have been his fault.</p><p>Amaguni Hitoya learns to read the signs of when Jakurai is feeling particularly cloudy, learns to differentiate goods days and bad days, and starts feeling like <em><strong>pack</strong></em>.</p><p>Amaguni Hitoya is <strong><em>pack </em></strong>and then he disappears. He leaves medical school and never looks back.</p><p>It feels like betrayal and Jakurai <em><strong>rages</strong></em>.</p><p>
  <strong>7.</strong>
</p><p>Being drafted into the war makes everything in him want to rage at the government for daring to force him to leave Shinjuku. The front-lines feels a lot like going home, violence and danger everywhere. </p><p>But he is a combat medic first, so he does everything he can to prevent anyone from dying. Each failure feels like a punch to the gut, but there's nothing he can do but move on even as his heart rages and flames dance just beneath the surface.</p><p>He is in the process of patching up a particularly stubborn soldier when a spark of yellow flashes and bright yellow flames come to life, healing the soldier's injuries, including a bloody cut that runs down the man's right eye, leaving behind a large scar and most likely blindness in that eye.</p><p>But Jakurai is stunned. <em>What the fuck?</em></p><p>Jinguji Jakurai is first and foremost a cloud. Being a sunny cloud had never been a possibility in his eyes.</p><p>He's never been the type to lean towards the extremes, nor was he particularly optimistic. So how in the world did he have sun flames?</p><p>But the proof was undeniable, the healed soldier lying in front of him, breathing evening out.</p><p>With a shake of his head, Jakurai turns towards other patients. This was a battlefield and now was not the time to freak out over the strangeness of dying will flames. Later, he'll learn to channel sun flames and learn to heal with them, but right now, the present was more important.</p><p>
  <strike>He doesn't notice the contemplative look the healed soldier gives him.</strike>
</p><p>
  <strong>8.</strong>
</p><p>The war is over, but the desire to heal burns strong, so he returns to Shinjuku and begins working at a hospital. He is called a saint for providing care for anyone and everyone. His sun flames are carefully hidden, but he uses them to heal, another skill in his arsenal. He becomes known in the medical community for performing miracles.</p><p>He returns from the war and Japan has changed. The Party of Words is filled with naivete, he thinks with scorn, words instead of weapons and gender-specific cities. The feeling of being trapped starts to grow.</p><p>Despite the weapon ban, he secures the knowledge that his will never be found thanks to some nifty mist work. And if he just so happens to carry chloroform, well, no one ever needs to know.</p><p>He meets Amemura Ramuda first, an active mist he thinks. As he learns to rap with the winged hypnosis microphone that The Party of Words has created, he learns more and more about Ramuda.</p><p>Blunt and tactless, yet cute and affectionate, Amemura Ramuda is a mystery. Despite the active mist flames that always seem to be out of reach and only seen out of the corner of his eyes, Ramuda never mentions them, so Jakurai tempers down his flames stays quiet.</p><p>Amemura Ramuda is knowledgeable in things that he shouldn't, things long past, and holds them like a carrot and stick. Jakurai can't help but feel both thrilled and collared, by the formation of <em>Kujaku Posse</em>, by Ramuda.</p><p>Then <em>Kujaku Posse</em> becomes <em>The Dirty Dawgs</em>.</p><p>Aohitsugi Samatoki is a storm, continuous and unrelenting. His anger comes and goes, flames flickering, and Jakurai can't help but feel a bit of pride and satisfaction each time Samatoki manages to coax his flames out, accidentally or not. He can't help but wonder if the Samatoki is aware of his own flame activeness, but they are never mentioned.</p><p>Yamada Ichiro is a sky, accepting and all-compassing. It feels a bit like coming home, but Ichiro is young and inactive, so Jakurai fends off every attempt at bonding. He's never liked being courted and this is no different. Even inactive, Ichiro is unconsciously attuned to his flames, enough that occassionally, a flicker of suspicion will be directed towards Jakurai, one that is tainted with both desire and hurt.</p><p>Even as Samatoki and Ramuda start bonding with the clueless sky, Jakurai stands strong on his refusal.</p><p>But Jakurai can't help but start growing fond, and they start to become like <em><strong>pack.</strong></em></p><p>
  <strong> <em> <strike>After all, he's always been weak to love.</strike> </em> </strong>
</p><p>
  <strong>9.</strong>
</p><p>When <em>The Dirty Dawgs</em> disbands, he isn't surprised.</p><p>It isn't difficult to notice Amemura's machinations, mist flames that twist and distorts the friendship and fondness in the group. But Jakurai, he acknowledges, isn't blameless.</p><p>While Amemura played at being a manipulator for the Chuuoku, the continuous rejection of any bonding created a wound for Amemura to poke at.</p><p>But clouds are notoriously hard to bind, and Jakurai is no different, inverted or not. And so he walks away, walks away from what could've been <em><strong>pack, </strong></em>regret and dark satisfaction mix into an ugly feeling in his heart. </p><p>They split into their own respective divisions, Ikebukuro, Yokohama, Shibuya, and Shinjuku. </p><p>He does his best make sure that Samatoki and Ichiro know that he'll still help them no matter what, as a doctor. </p><p>Amemura, however, makes him furious, anger stirring each time he encounters the pink-haired man. He thinks that maybe, this is what it truly means to <em><strong>hate</strong></em> someone. The cloud rage continues to build up inside, and he wonders when his walls will break.</p><p>In the safety of his apartment, a cloud wolf lays beside him, and emptily, he wonders when he'll break, an empty shell of a cloud. </p><p>His territory has been taken by the Chuuoku, and his pack is gone. </p><p>
  <strike> <strong>Shinjuku has become his cage.</strong> </strike>
</p><p>
  <strong>10.</strong>
</p><p>Kannonzaka Doppo and Izanami Hifumi are simultaneously entertaining and annoying.</p><p>He meets Kannonzaka Doppo first, a patient in need therapy. The man is both strong and weak in ways Jakurai has never contemplated or willingly endured. He's strong in that he stays in his current job while being verbally beaten. He's also weak in that he doesn't walk away from the verbal abuse, afraid of society as a whole. </p><p>Yet somehow, this terrified red haired man is a rain. Inactive or not, Jakurai can feel the calming exasperation and exhaustion that comes in waves, especially around Izanami Hifumi.</p><p>He meets Izanami Hifumi through Doppo. He is bright and cheerful, loud and childish. A host, yet terrified of women. The stalker situation is... odd. He's never been the best at de-escalating situations, and, well, this is no different. The personality changes are interesting, though.</p><p>The personality-changing host is equally strange, a lightening that glows like a sun. His desire to protect and achieve his goals is admirable, albeit in a loud and occasionally flirtatious manner.  </p><p>In the end, he asks them to join him, to change the world, to be <em><strong>free.</strong></em></p><p>
  <em>(If he happens to leave a couple of threatening letters in a certain boss's office, and if Doppo's boss suddenly starts being nicer to him, well no one needs to know.) </em>
</p><p>Later, the former members of <em>The Dirty Dawgs</em> will be reunited upon the battlefield that is known as rap battles.</p><p>Later, he will see the soldier who was there when he first activates his sun flames, but will not realize it until later.</p><p>Later, Amaguni Hitoya will show up again, a sea of anger and hurt that has festered and grown between them.</p><p>On stage, he faces <em>Fling Posse</em>, he faces <em>Mad Trigger Crew</em>, and beside him, the warm feeling of <em><strong>pack</strong></em> pervades. </p><p>And so he fights with the viciousness of a cloud and heals with the cheer of a sun.</p><p>
  <strong>For Hifumi and Doppo are <em>his</em> <em>pack</em> now, and let there be no mercy for those who touch <em>what is his.</em></strong>
</p>
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